


In Time

by otayuriistheliteralbest



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Almost Dating, Angst, Background Viktuuri - Freeform, Canon Compliant, Competition, Friendship, Gen, Growing Up, almost Chris/Viktor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-20
Updated: 2018-10-20
Packaged: 2019-08-05 00:30:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,081
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16357157
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/otayuriistheliteralbest/pseuds/otayuriistheliteralbest
Summary: Originally written for the Kings on Ice zine. Chris and Viktor become fast friends, constantly coming together in figure skating competitions around the world. But Viktor Nikiforov’s shadow is a hard place to be in and keep a friendship going...





	In Time

The icy air in the rink swirls around him, crisp as he breathes it in through his nose, out through his mouth. Again and again. In, out. _Breathe_. Blues and reds and whites flash all around him in a blur of color. Chris winces as he pulls out of the pancake spin, taking an easy lap around the rink to loosen up his muscles. He shakes out his arms and shoulders and then throws himself back into practice.

_Nothing is the same without Viktor in the competition_ , he thinks to himself. He’s been in the senior division for so long now, has it really been almost ten years? It feels like a lifetime, and everywhere he’s turned before now, Viktor was there, one step above him on the podium, just slightly better.

With Viktor out of the competition, there is a chance for Chris now. He placed silver at the GPF and Worlds the previous season, so there is actually a solid chance for him. But he can feel the ache in his knee, and it worries him. Just the other day, he heard that the fifteen-year-old Russian boy, Yuri Plisetsky, would be joining their ranks. And if only Katsuki Yuuri hadn’t choked at last year’s GPF, who knows what would have happened to the final rankings? Chris may not have even placed, had Yuuri been in top form that day.

Chris shakes his head. He can’t think about that right now, not when he needs to figure out the music for the next season. Still, what is a season in professional figure skating without Viktor to push him?

He remembers far too much. 

\--- 

After they meet for the first time at Juniors, Chris and Viktor seem to run into each other _constantly_ at competitions. It doesn’t take long for them to become fast friends, trading tips and massaging aching muscles, joking around as they jump into hotel pools in one country or another. They naturally gravitate toward one another, the two leading men who blow away all the other skaters’ scores, working their way into everyone’s hearts.

Chris helps Viktor with his spins, and Viktor teaches Chris how to land his quad lutz. They can both speak English, but Chris teaches Viktor French and they slowly switch over to the language in their texts and video chats.

_“It’s just such a beautiful language, Chris,_ ” Viktor tells him one night. It’s late for both of them, but it’s the off-season and they’re teenagers who will live forever. They can lose out on a couple hours of sleep, even if it means their coaches will notice and yell at them the next day. Chris has his laptop propped up on a pillow and he’s spread out on his stomach on the bed. “ _I love how it sounds, how it looks on the page or in a text_.”

Chris blushes slightly, burrowing his face in the pillow he’s propped up against. To Chris’s ears, it sounds like Viktor’s saying, ‘ _I love how you sound when you talk_.’ He laughs, embarrassed by the thought, and lifts up his head to look at the computer screen.

“ _Do you have any ideas for what you’re going to skate to this year_?” Chris asks, changing the subject before he says something foolish.

“ _I have some ideas, but Yakov doesn’t like them. I’ll wear him down_ ,” Viktor says, his grin lighting up his eyes. When Viktor knows what he wants, he will stop at nothing to get it. Chris knows that all too well.

“ _I can’t wait to hear them_ ,” he says. 

\--- 

The articles on Chris’s phone seem to flash at him in bright, black and white letters.

“Giacometti Still Short... Unable to Surpass Nikiforov.”

“Never good enough: is Giacometti distracted by love? What does BFF Viktor Nikiforov have to say?”

They are all like that, one after the other. Sport reporters and bloggers who think they know the world of figure skating, _think_ they know Chris or Viktor and their inner workings, their method, their potential. Chris lets his phone slide out of his hand, curling stiff and shaking fingers into a fist. His face is wet - _why is his face wet?_ \- as he punches the pillow beside him on the bed, one of the many plush toys he’s been receiving ever since he joined the senior division a few years earlier.

Tears are streaming down his face. What do they know about him, anyway? So what if the judges see more artistry in Viktor’s routines, that he can land more quads than Chris? Viktor can’t spin like Chris, doesn’t have the same appeal that Chris can have. _Will_ have.

Chris jumps up from his bed, the punching-bag pillow looking a little worse for wear, and begins to pace. If he can’t show the world he deserves his place on the podium, after all he’s been through, he’ll _make_ them see it.

He presses his lips together, tripping over a cat toy on his way to the desk in the corner of his bedroom. Chris rights himself, plopping into the desk chair and cracking open his laptop. He knows exactly the kind of music he needs in his programme for the next season, and Josef will have no choice in the matter. He’ll see just how much Chris needs this. 

\--- 

Chris’s routines take on a more sensual quality. Where before, the fan who knew where to look could see the movement and grace of the music, now even the most casual of fans can see the artistry, the level of detail that flows throughout Chris’s body as he feels the music on ice. He throws himself into his routines with his whole self, grasping tightly to every breath, the flowing movement of his arms and hands just _so_ to shape the music with his body. He gains his focus.

“I never get to talk to you anymore,” Viktor pouts, and even though they are talking on the phone, Chris can _hear_ it in his voice. “I know that you’ve been working hard on your routines, but I miss talking to you.”

_I miss you._ Chris can hear it in between the lines, the hurt in his voice.

“I’m sorry, Viktor,” Chris replies, his hand curling around the phone as if he’s trying to protect himself, to hide the white lie on the tip of his tongue. “My coach has been pushing me harder than ever this season, and I can’t afford any distractions.”

Viktor sighs on the other side of the line. “Ok, I understand. Let me know when you can talk, ok?”

Chris’s eyes can’t focus on anything and his vision skitters nervously. “Yeah, sure. Ok.” 

\---

He scores a personal best that season. Again and again, and yet he can’t seem to surpass Viktor. He’s always one step ahead of Chris, with no end in sight. At Europeans, at least, he is able to shake himself from Viktor’s shadow, but that is only because they are in different competitions.

Chris has just collapsed on his hotel bed at Worlds when a rushed knock sounds at his door. He groans, assuming that it must be Josef. He heaves himself off of the bed, scrubbing at his sleep-tired face.

“Une seconde, Josef. J’suis la--” he starts, but when Chris opens the door, it isn’t to his coach, but rather a teary-eyed Viktor. Chris is shocked to discover that they are the same height. He’s managed to avoid hanging out with Viktor so much in the past year that he missed it. Chris’s heart hurts at the thought, and he opens his arms wide. Viktor doesn’t hesitate and jumps into Chris’s arms, burrowing his face into the other teen’s shoulder.

“Do you hate me, Chris?” Viktor asks, tears soaking into Chris’s t-shirt. His voice is muffled by the fabric. “Is that why you’ve been avoiding me?”

Chris lets out a broken breath and maneuvers them into the hotel room so he can close the door behind them with one arm, the other still holding Viktor close.

“Viktor, I could never hate you.” Chris coaxes Viktor out of his arms and brushes the tears from his face with his thumbs. “Come sit down, let’s talk.”

Viktor nods, and he looks so small in that moment. He chopped off his long, flowing hair in the past year and it’s strange to see him without it. He looks older, more mature than he had when they first met as children.

Chris sits on the armchair, Viktor on the edge of the bed. He looks away from Chris, like he doesn’t know what to say to him. It hurts that Chris has done this to them, when they used to be so close.

“Viktor,” he starts, and the other man turns his head to look at him. “I mean it, I could never hate you. What I hate is all the media hype, the headlines, the rumors… I felt like I could never be myself, not when all the reporters out there are saying things like, ‘Giacometti: forever Nikiforov’s shadow’ and worse. I’ve been trying to find myself this season, but in doing so… I’m worried that I lost you. I’m sorry.”

Chris looks down at his hands, unwilling to see how Viktor responds. It’s a bit of a surprise, then, when Viktor’s hands come into view, grasping Chris’s tightly-clenched hands in his as he kneels on the floor in front of him.

“Oh, Chris, how could you ever think that?” Viktor says. “You’ll always be my friend.”

Chris finds his center after they talk until late that night, and the commentators speculate wildly about his performances in both of his programs. He throws himself into the programs like he always does, but there is this faraway look in his eyes, this meditative quality to his movements that stuns everyone who watches him. It seems to those watching as if the music flows through the tips of his fingers, the power of his legs as he spins and jumps.

Chris places silver, again, to Viktor’s gold, but it is a narrow margin of 1.06 points and a personal best. Standing on the podium, his eyes well up with tears and he’s grinning at Viktor, who offers his hand out to Chris. He takes it, twining their fingers together, and he couldn’t be happier. Cameras flash all around them, and the two friends can’t help but to laugh. 

\---

Chris isn’t shocked to hear that Viktor has flown halfway across the world to coach Katsuki Yuuri. Honestly, the man will do anything on a whim, and he hasn’t stopped talking about Yuuri since the GPF banquet that season.

“You saw the video, didn’t you?” Viktor calls him out of the blue. It’s six in the morning in Switzerland, and Chris doesn’t doubt that Viktor waited until it was late enough for him to call. “The grace, the way he moved. There was no music, but I could _feel_ it in my bones. I need to coach him, Chris.”

Chris sips his tea, smiling at his excited friend’s exclamation. “Yes, Viktor, I saw the video. He hasn’t forgotten you, so just give him time.”

“But what if--” Viktor starts.

“No buts!” Chris interrupts. “Show him your sexy side, get to know him. What you saw at the banquet isn’t the only side of him you should know.”

Viktor sighs on the other end of the line. “You’re right. Of course you’re right.”

Chris downs the rest of his tea and sets it on the kitchen counter, heaving himself up to his slippered feet.

“Listen, as much as I want to give you love advice at six in the morning, I need to get ready to go to the rink,” Chris tells him. “I’m giving Josef my ideas for the season before practice.”

He can tell that Viktor is tapping his pointer finger against his lips. It’s in the way the other man pauses.

“Okay, sorry for calling you so early.”

“It’s no problem,” Chris says. “I’ll talk to you later, Mr. Coach. _Bonne chance._ ”

Viktor snorts on the other end of the line. “Yeah, ok, Chris. We’ll see how I do.”

Chris hangs up and changes into his practice clothes. He gives his little white furball a pat on the head and jogs out the front door to head to the rink, his mind whirring with thoughts for this season’s programs.

Chris smiles to himself as the wind rushes past his face, swirling around him.


End file.
